Italy has asked Brazil to extradite soccer star Robinho to serve a nine-year prison sentence for the gang rape of an Albanian woman in a Milan nightclub.
The 38-year-old former Manchester City star was sentenced in 2019 for the 2013 attack on the 23-year-old when he was playing for AC Milan.
The Brazilian international, real name Robson De Souza, appealed the conviction, but several Italian courts upheld it, including the Supreme Court of Cassation in January this year.
Now, the Italian Ministry of Justice has written a request to Brazil to extradite Robinho along with his friend Ricardo Falco, who was also convicted in the case.
The Brazilian Constitution does not allow its citizens to be extradited from their homeland.
Italy has asked Brazil to extradite soccer star Robinho (pictured) to serve a nine-year prison sentence for the gang rape of an Albanian woman in a Milan nightclub
The 38-year-old former Manchester City star was sentenced in 2019 for the attack on a 213-year-old player in January 2013 when he was playing for AC Milan (pictured March 2013)
After the charges were first filed, a Brazilian newspaper revealed the content of wiretapped phone conversations the footballer had with friends, including one in which he tries to laugh at the accusations.
“I laugh because I don’t care,” Robinho is heard saying. The woman was completely drunk. She doesn’t even know what happened.
The charges date back to 2013, when Robinho was 28 years old and playing in Serie A for AC Milan.
On the night of January 22, the soccer player and a group of at least six people, including his wife, had been drinking at the Sio Café nightclub in the city.
It was there that they met the Albanian woman, who was celebrating her birthday with some of her friends.
At some point in the night, Robinho accompanied his wife back home before meeting his friends at the club, where they started drinking with the woman.
The woman says that Robinho, who was to celebrate his own birthday three days later, and his friends forced her to drink until she was almost unconscious.
It was then that she was taken to a private dressing room where Robinho and Falco sexually assaulted her while the other four men watched.
Robinho has repeatedly denied the charges, saying the sex was consensual and his only regret is cheating on his wife Vivian (pictured together)
Robinho and Falco then ‘shared’ the woman with the other four men, Italian media reported at the time.
The athlete was arrested and questioned on the allegations in 2014. He admitted to having oral sex with the woman, but claimed it was consensual.
After the interrogation, police tapped Robinho’s phones and recorded conversations bragging about the attack with his friends.
During the investigation, four of Robinho’s friends who were allegedly involved in the attack but were never identified left the country for Brazil.
The same year, Robinho left Italy to play again for his boyhood club Santos, and Falco also left the country.
The couple was tried in absentia in November 2017 and found guilty of rape, with judges handing down a nine-year sentence.
Speaking during the sentencing hearing, the judges made it clear that the ‘contempt’ for the victim shown in the intercepted phone calls was an aggravating factor.
“Particularly negative emphasis should be given to the tone and expressions used in commenting on the facts, describing the girl with humiliating epithets and often in crude and derogatory terms,” they said.
At the time of the attack, Robinho, 28, was playing in Serie A for AC Milan (pictured), but returned to Brazil before the charges were filed in court.
“The defendants even laughed several times at the fact, thus revealing an absolute disregard for the condition of the victim, who was exposed to repeated harassment, as well as acts of sexual violence through particularly invasive abuse.”
The couple was also ordered to jointly pay the woman $73,000 in damages.
The footballer went through the academy of the Brazilian club Santos, where he was often compared to Pelé as one of the best prospects they had produced.
He played for Real Madrid and Manchester City before a loan spell at Milan between 2013 and 2014, and was also capped for his country.
After the accusations against him in Italy surfaced, he returned to Brazil and also spent time playing in Turkey.
In 2020, he transferred back to Santos, where he was due to finish his career playing for minimum wage.
But Santos was forced to terminate the contract amid protests over the rape case, and one of the main sponsors stopped supporting the club.
In an interview shortly after the club terminated his contract, Robinho continued to deny the rape charge, saying his only regret of the night was that he was unfaithful to his wife, Vivian.
Asked about the pressure that had caused Santos to break his contract, he replied: ‘Unfortunately there is this feminist movement.’
